Food & Drink
Top City Spots
Myriad's restaurants have earned critical acclaim and worldwide praise, yet the group remains humble, saying it continues to strive for excellence in each endeavor
by Hanna Aronovich
THE PLEASURE AND CELEBRATION OF DINING, SEEN THROUGHOUT NEW York's Winter and Summer Restaurant Weeks, is a year-round sentiment at the Myriad Restaurant Group's establishments.
Winter Restaurant Week, held each year in late January and early February allows diners to savor the city's most sought-after cuisine. Montrachet, Tribeca Grill, Nobu and Pulse, four of the restaurants under the Myriad umbrella, have been mainstays of the event.
What began in summer 1992 as a weeklong, lunch-special program, has evolved into a bi-annual, lunch and dinner, two-week long, dining extravaganza with the top 170-plus New York City restaurants participating. Select restaurants offer a three-course lunch and dinner for special rates.
New York City & Co. sponsors the event, and Myriad partner and Director of Marketing Tracy Nieporent was recently named restaurant chair of the organization.
"New York City Restaurant Week has become the model for restaurant weeks all over the country," Nieporent explains. "People schedule their vacations around it. It's very customer driven."
Just as the drive behind Restaurant Week is customer satisfaction, so too are Myriad's restaurants. Along with the four Restaurant Week-participating establishments, Myriad runs eight other operations, ranging from upscale French cuisine to infusion-style Japanese.
Montrachet was the first restaurant, established in 1985. The objective was to offer outstanding food and wine without the barriers of more formal restaurants.
"Customers used to have to dress up in a jacket and tie when visiting a French restaurant," Nieporent says. "The menus were hard to navigate and it was important to understand French."
At Montrachet, customers are invited to be comfortable and have a good time.
"There's greater informality now," Nieporent explains. "Restaurants are more welcoming and menus are more accessible. We originated that concept and a lot of other places are doing it now."
In 1990, Myriad opened Tribeca Grill with partner Robert De Niro, and achieved numerous industry accolades.
Four years later, Nobu and Rubicon opened. Nobu, which serves Japanese dishes infused with South American flavors, is also affiliated with De Niro and Nobuyuki Matsuhisa, "the best Japanese chef in the world," according to the Zagat Guide's review.
California-based Rubicon serves a variety of dishes, and is a partnership with Francis Ford Coppola, Robin Williams and De Niro.
In 1995, Myriad opened TriBakery, a neighborhood cafe, and Layla, presenting Mediterranean cuisine. Each operation quickly won critical acclaim. Nobu London opened in 1997, followed by Next Door Nobu in fall 1998.
In addition. Myriad currently serves major consulting management roles for Pulse at The Sports Club/LA; the Coach House in Martha's Vineyard, Mass.; and Lucca in Boca Raton, Fla.; and 15 RIA in Washington D.C.
The company has worked on consulting assignments for Starwood Hotels, Interstate Hotels, Neiman Marcus, BrainReserve, General Electric (Villa Christina), Harley-Davidson Cafe, Millennium Broadway (formerly Hotel Macklowe), Fresco Restaurant, Jordan Vineyard & Winery and Joseph Phelps Vineyards.
MYRIAD SUCCESS
Despite its renowned success. Myriad says it never desired to be the "empire builder" it is often called. Since 1985, Myriad says, it simply strove to create unique and memorable dining experiences for its guests.
And while the company has achieved that goal and then some, Nieporent says it took extreme attention to detail.
"The common approach for every restaurant is you have to stay vital, fresh and relevant to everyone," he explains. "When we started with a core of restaurants in lower Manhattan, it was easier to make the rounds because we were physically close to the locations."
Since the company has expanded geographically, as well as conceptually, Nieporent says Myriad has created a solid infrastructure to keep operations running smoothly.
"The key is to know each market that we're in and make sure we're important to those customers," he explains. "These are not cookie-cutter restaurants. What works in Boca Raton does not always work in San Francisco."
While the concepts and flavors vary, the common thread throughout the group is a level of professionalism that ensures great value at each dining experience.
"Each restaurant is chef-driven," Nieporent explains. "That doesn't mean that our chefs are famous, although some are, but it pertains to the quality of the food."
Myriad does not require line cooks to simply follow recipes. "It's a matter of having a chef in there who is tuned in to contemporary desires on the plate," Nieporent says. "We have professionals running our kitchens, and chefs with originality, competence and passion."
Although not all of Myriad's concepts offer haute cuisine, the level of professionalism is constant, he insists.
LOYAL FOLLOWING
When asked whether he would call Myriad a success, Nieporent immediately jokes, "That's hard to say--restaurateurs are fatalistic. We sometimes feel like we have one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peel.
"But I think that for me," he continues, "when I walk around at night, looking in the windows and see that the restaurants are full of people having a good time, that's when I feel successful."
Although each Myriad restaurant has won awards, Nieporent says that's not the marker of success. "When our customers are happy, that's what it's about," he says. "We're not the only restaurant on the block, and when people choose you and feel an affinity for you, that means a lot."
Customer loyalty was proven after 9/11, with six of Myriad's restaurants within a few miles of Ground Zero. "After that, we thought we might be closed permanently," Nieporent reflects. "But when people were encouraged to embrace life, they came right back. We have a core of very devoted guests--that's how I would define success."